Good day to lock

12 Jun Good day to lock

The bond market continues to trade in a way that counters common logic. This makes predicting long and short term directions of mortgage rates.
Even the good economic news days haven’t deterred improvement in the bond market the past two days. Mortgage bonds had a nice run higher yesterday
and are higher again so far to start the morning. However, because bonds are now trading in a very wide channel, the market will be subject to
the “whipsaw” effect where the direction of prices can change without notice. Although the technical picture looks good at the moment, until
bonds are able to break out of the nasty channel that has driven rates higher, we must assume things will get worse in the near future.

June’s preliminary reading on Consumer Sentiment was reported at 94.6. This was a very strong reading and surpassed the market’s expectation of 91.2.
It was also much higher than last month’s read of 90.7. The other highly anticipated report of the day was May’s Producer Price Index (PPI).
It was reported that prices on a manufacturing level increased by +.05%. This was a bit hotter than the +.04% anticipated. PPI less food
and energy (Core PPI) was in line with estimates at +.01%. This brings the year over year PPI at -1.1%, and the Core PPI at +.06%. Because
this measures price movements on the manufacturing level, it isn’t as widely considered as a read on consumer price movement. However, it can
be an early indicator for future price changes on a consumer level.

Mortgage bonds are priced a bit better today, making it a great day to secure an interest rate. Until bonds break out of the current downward channel,
there will be some days that provide better pricing than others even while rates are in a general up trend. Today is one such day.